In the last month, more than $6 million has been spent on social media to try and influence Australians' opinions on a range of social and political issues.
Shared evenly across the nation, that would equate to about 24 cents per person.
But in WA, the spending is about 15 per cent higher than that, reflecting the key role the state is expected to play in the federal election.
In the last week, that figure has jumped even higher – nearing 20 per cent – as the push to win over West Australians intensifies.
An analysis by the ABC has revealed stark differences between how the two major parties are running their online campaigns, and exactly where that money is being spent.
Last week between April 23 and 29, political parties, lobby groups and a range of other organisations handed $232,922 to Facebook's parent company, Meta, to run adverts on its platforms in Western Australia.
Labor pours money into interest-group Facebook pages
Around 40 per cent of that, $93,045, came from the Labor Party, or pages affiliated with it.
A big chunk of that was spent by pages like Stand Up for WA and Every School Every Child, which often only reveal their affiliation in small text revealing who the ads are paid for.
Just $13,209 of the party's social media spend went towards candidates' pages, split roughly evenly between incumbents and hopeful candidates.
By comparison, the Liberal Party has spent $33,598 across its accounts – more than two-thirds of that on candidates' pages.
But that figure was boosted by the efforts of Andrew Hastie, who was the 10th biggest political spender in WA over that period, forking out $5,705 for Facebook and Instagram ads.
And while Labor is hoping to pick up a number of seats in the west, Mr Hastie's seat of Canning is not one that has received much attention, held by a margin of 11.6 per cent.
Mr Hastie's office did not respond to questions asked by the ABC about his spending.
Advert gets almost one million hits in four days
A look at some of the posts this money has been spent on shows why the parties are putting so much effort into this space.
Facebook's advert library shows that one ad, posted by the page 'Stand Up for WA' and paid for by WA Labor, was seen between 900,000 and a million times in Western Australia over just four days.
The estimated spend for that reach is between $10,000 and $15,000.
Across the 30-second video, the Labor Party is only mentioned in a brief disclaimer at the end, with that time used to remind West Australians of Scott Morrison's comments and actions during the pandemic and the Black Saturday bushfires.
"If WA can't trust ScoMo, let's give someone else a go," the ad suggests.
In total, the $22,478 spent by the page in just a week secured it between 1,840,000 and 2,070,000 impressions, which is the number of times the advert appeared on a screen.
Mr Hastie's spend of $5,705, on a range of ads both highlighting work underway in his community and warning against a Labor-Greens alliance, got him between 446,000 and 516,000 impressions over that same period.
Labor hones national image as Liberals highlight candidates
Curtin University professor of internet studies, Tama Leaver, said that kind of spending makes sense as parties try to make every dollar count.
"If you've got a war chest as it were, spending it specifically on voters that are thought to be swinging voters is a much better way of spending an advertising dollar than it is to put a 15-second ad onto a show that most people aren't watching on television," he said.
And the spending in WA shows exactly what each side is trying to achieve, with Labor focusing on its party image, while the Liberals highlight the profile of local members.
"It means that if you've already voted for someone in the past and you're trying to keep them, then that face hopefully is already familiar to you, but I think Labor is also doubling-down on the fact that there are some Labor candidates that probably aren't as well known," Professor Leaver said.
"Labor's had a number of fairly similar sort of leaders, so I think they do need to build the profile of Anthony Albanese for sure.
"And to be fair, Scott Morrison is fighting the opposite battle, I think his profile is probably too loud and they're trying to moderate that profile by reminding everyone that there's a whole team there."
Different set of rules for social media platforms
Professor Leaver said another reason for the significant spend this year could be more people switching off from traditional media.
"People really aren't seeking out news in the traditional sense as much as they used to, and yet social media is still part and parcel of their life," he said.
And while the spend so far has been significant, he expects the peak will arrive in the days before the election.
That's because election advertising is banned on radio and TV during a "blackout period" from the start of the Thursday before the election until polls close at 6pm on election night.
"And yet those same rules do not apply to social media, so at that point instead of there being no advertising I think what we're going to see is it'll absolutely skyrocket on social media for those last four days," Professor Leaver said.
"Everybody getting a bit of relief from that advertising and having a chance to think for a few days, which is the intention of that laws, seems a good idea.
"But it's only a good idea if it includes social media, which it doesn't."
